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She talks!

26th March, 2009 - Posted by karen -

Ok it’s time for a small touch of parental bragging here. Evelyn keeps amazing me with her verbal skills. She’s 23 months old and we long ago lost count of the words she knows. We can have simple conversations and Evelyn is now speaking in sentences of 5-8 words (e.g. “Great, I can colour the trumpet grey again”). She knows the alphabet, about half of the numbers from 1-20, most of the basic shapes and is working on colours. She also knows a lot of animal names (probably the weirdest is “skunk”) and their sounds. She is also capable of pronouncing some three syllable words (e.g. octagon and clarinet) and is learning the sounds of musical instruments.

I think she’s naturally talented in her linguistic skills and we have tried our best to encourage them. Evelyn has always loved books, even from the time she was 2 months old, so reading has always been a part of her day. We also bought a pretty good toy called “Teach my Toddler” at Christmas and she has been learning the alphabet, colours, shapes and numbers from that. We also bought some wood alphabet blocks that have numbers and animals on them too. A lot of the books we and other people have bought have been very helpful in her learning as well - right now one of her favourites is “Chicka Chicka 1-2-3″ (which Evelyn calls “Chicken 1-2-5″) that she got for Christmas. We haven’t pushed her in any of this - she plays with the toy in her own way and has picked things up from listening to us talk and read to her. I think it’s a great demonstration of how learning really can be fun and effective when it’s left up to the kid and the parents just guide and augment what the child learns. All I can say is that I hope it keeps up throughout her life!

We have also introduced some children’s television into her life, mostly as a way to keep ourselves sane. At her age Evelyn gets bored about every 20-30 minutes and very often wants someone to play with her, so having some good quality children’s programs around is a lifesaver for showering, cooking, or when we’re sick or tired. Right now her favourite is “Little Einsteins” which really impressed us. In each episode the characters have to solve some problems, but a classical music piece and a work of art is introduced, along with something about geography or nature. Evelyn consequently knows all the character’s names, loves the rocket ship (who can’t talk but can communicate as well as turn into a whole bunch of cool things) and has developed an interst in music (which Dan is very happy about!). Evelyn remembers details from the stories and never hesitates to remind us about them and she’s even learning to sing. I don’t know whether I feel good about this or bad - after all she is learning some great things … but it’s from TV. It makes me feel like I am cheating.

Other favourites include Pocoyo (narrated by Stephen Fry BTW), Super Why, Sid the Science Kid and The Mighty Jungle. We also watch the occasional nature documentary when there’s something in PBS. I’m so glad there is am abundance of good children’s programs like these available!